Inside was a perfect mess of my late father-in-law\u2019s book research: chicken-scratch scribbles across mounds of cocktail napkins, backs of envelopes, bits of small sheets \u2014 including remnants of an amorously illustrated \u00e0 faire aujourd\u2019hui<\/em> (to do today) notepad, scattered index cards, sectioned thick spirals (via fraying Post-it notes), and of course, his trusty 8″ by 4″ Daily News<\/em> notebooks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n An acclaimed lifelong journalist who grew up in Pine Bluff, Ark., Bill Bell had worked extensively on a book about a nutty, rural Arkansas college football team (the Arkansas A & M Boll Weevils) with a strange sort of coach, who from 1939\u201341 had become famous, and in certain circles infamous, for playing and losing \u2014 from coast to coast \u2014 for fun. However, Bill and his literary agent increasingly pictured a bigger book, one centered on a slight, mild-mannered but fiery ex-college coach turned full-time history teacher. The hard-to-fathom story of Coach Stewart Ferguson \u2014 later known as \u201cFergie\u201d \u2014 was in motion. Battling failing health, Bill would make a strong push to capture Coach Ferguson\u2019s turbulent and defining earlier years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Upon scanning several of Bill\u2019s chapter files, I, too, was hooked by the fascinating Fergie and felt a strong pull to shape the book into a biography. I was especially energized to dig into Fergie\u2019s later years, in which he, as a high school football coach, left an indelible imprint on the Black Hills\u2019 still frontier town and close-knit community of Deadwood. I reset to full-research mode, channeled my days as sportswriter and editor of the Colgate Maroon<\/em> (pre 1992 merger with the Colgate Snooze<\/em> [couldn\u2019t resist]) and went about trying to walk in Bill\u2019s \u2014 and Fergie\u2019s \u2014 footsteps, which led me to Arkansas, Louisiana, and across South Dakota.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As for the whole writing part, I started with some simple internal marching orders: Don\u2019t screw this up<\/em>! This maybe wasn\u2019t the most productive approach, so I pivoted to something more positive, though hardly pressure free: Do right by Bill<\/em>. Not surprisingly, my overriding thoughts focused on ensuring the final manuscript would read as one voice. To address early agita around revising, moving, or deleting any of Bill\u2019s content, I leaned on a healthy dose of color-coded fonts and annotated strikethroughs; every new draft specified what changed from the previous version. If a prospective publisher wanted the play-by-play \u201csave as\u201d anatomy of a manuscript, I\u2019d be ready.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Eventually, the multicolor fonts faded, the strikethroughs disappeared, and voices evolved into voice. A spectrum of doubts shifted into a semblance of rhythm and ascending confidence. At a certain point, who wrote what was no longer a thing, which felt freeing. Writing and rewriting became solely about serving the story \u2014 sharing and celebrating Fergie\u2019s wild ride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Reflecting on the entire labor-of-love process, I gravitated to some narrative nonfiction guideposts that kept me on track. Holding on to the story \u2014 and character \u2014 helped me focus on Fergie\u2019s journey and ensure the reader rooted him on through his multiple missteps. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I also slowed down when necessary and embraced all the circuitous paths of the research process, realizing that surprises and new nuggets could be around the corner. In fact, some of my favorite finds came from allowing myself to just read and learn. This was particularly true as I consumed late 1800s to early 1900s newspaper issues of the Deadwood Pioneer-Times<\/em> and the Lead Daily Call<\/em> and worked to understand the complex relationship \u2014 and bitter rivalry \u2014 between the twin Black Hills cities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For interviewing Deadwood High School alumni, I ensured I was extra prepared. The due diligence around gathering old photos and accumulating football game-day details were essential triggers to spark specific decades-earlier memories and other revealing insights. Nearly as important was actively listening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Through it all, I fought myself to perfect wherever possible but try<\/em> not to demand perfection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Approximately eight years after I peeked inside that big, dusty box, the whirlwind of feelings came roaring back when I was preparing the book\u2019s acknowledgments. Dubbed by his family as \u201cthe thing in the basement,\u201d Bill had the unique ability to do a crossword, play guitar, read, watch college football, belt out Johnny Cash, and nap all at the same time. Yeah, and as a lifelong newspaperman, he could also bang out stories with the best of \u2019em. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Those stories took Bill literally around the world for the United Press International \u2014 from South America to Europe and Africa \u2014 before he settled down in Connecticut and started up at the New York Daily News<\/em>. Spending years as the religion editor and \u201cCity Beat\u201d columnist, he was a witty, gritty, wise, and beloved newsroom figure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While his newsroom buddies knew how excited Bill was about his second act as an author, I only became acutely aware after stumbling upon a document during some additional Connecticut basement book research. Circa 2004, Bill Bell typed up the not-so-little, therapeutic ditty It didn\u2019t take this long to<\/em>\u2026 Enjoy one of the 53-strong beauties, a nod to Fergie\u2019s religion-centric musings in the book: \u201cIt didn\u2019t take Adam this long to convince Eve they should be more than friends.<\/em>\u201d On Bill\u2019s behalf, I\u2019m thrilled the wait is finally over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This essay by Peter Oltchick \u201991 includes text from a forthcoming book by Bill Bell and Oltchick, <\/em>Football for Fun: The Story of Coach Stewart \u201cFergie\u201d Ferguson (South Dakota Historical Society Press, September 2023). Oltchick is also the author of the children\u2019s picture book <\/em>Clean Clara. He says 13 is indeed his lucky number, thanks to both of his kids\u2019 birthdays (including one on Colgate Day!). He can be reached at pjo24@yahoo.com.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A box Peter Oltchick \u201991 found in his late father-in-law’s basement led him on an eight-year journey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1260,"featured_media":12803,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[1692,729,1695,1673,1691,1696,62,1694,1554,1693,1066,123],"coauthors":[135],"class_list":["post-12795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-voices","tag-arkansas","tag-book","tag-columnist","tag-connecticut","tag-curiousity","tag-essay","tag-football","tag-new-york-daily-news","tag-press","tag-united-press-international","tag-writer","tag-writing"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-3kn","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2023\/07\/BB-PO.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1260"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12795"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12963,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795\/revisions\/12963"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12795"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2023\/07\/Book_It-Takes-Two-1024x768.jpg\")
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